|
THE
National Food Authority (NFA) assured the public that
despite the failure of the rice tender held Monday, the
supply of rice during the lean months of July, August
and September will be adequate.
The
Philippines was hoping to buy 675,000 metric tons (MT)
for buffer stocking, but the lone bidder in Monday’s
rice tender, Vietnam Southern Corp. (Vinafood), was
disqualified, prompting the NFA to declare the auction a
failure.
“We have
already procured around 1.7 million metric tons [MMT] of
rice before the lean season, and this volume will be
enough to tide us over the lean months,” said NFA
Administrator Jessup Navarro.
Navarro
said the 675,000 MT the Philippines is seeking to import
will ensure it will have enough rice until the end of
the year. The Philippine government is seeking to import
as much as 2.2 MMT to plug its production shortfall and
to stock up on rice for the lean months.
If the
Philippines fails to bring in the 675,000 MT it
auctioned out Monday, NFA officials said they are
already looking at a number of options for sourcing the
additional volume.
The
government is already negotiating for up to 100,000 MT
of rice from the East Asia Emergency Rice Reserve (EAERR)
program. The EAERR was established by Asean and
China,
Japan and South Korea (Asean+3).
Navarro
also disclosed the possibility that the Philippines will
ask for more rice from the United States under the
commodity loan program of the
United States
government called Public Law (PL) 480. “The
US
government has not yet announced the amount of loan it
is willing to extend to us for this year, but we’re
looking at the possibility of [using it] for rice,” he
said.
The NFA
said it will aggressively buy palay from domestic
farmers to prop up its stocks.
“We now
buy palay with a higher moisture content because we
already have our own driers,” said Navarro.
On May
9, the
Philippines
will hold a quota-specific import auction for 163,000 MT
of rice. |
